It honestly seems like technology affects older generations more than newer ones. Look at the people most susceptible to fake news online, vast majority over the age of 50. Younger people understand how the internet works; you can’t trust everything you read online.
An open letter to India’s youth: Get off that smartphone. It can destroy you
131–140 of 143 posts
Re: An open letter to India’s youth: Get off that smartphone. It can destroy you
#132When I was kid, I remember my parents yelling at me playing 'useless' games at the end of the street with my 'good for nothing' friends.
When I was a teen, I remember them not liking me watching "too much" of TV and grumbling about reading 'no good' fiction magazines.
Now this.. "get off the phone" advice.
The key is, the choice must come from with-in, like Diogenes of Snopes[1] tells Alexader the great to stand out of his sun.
Until the kids are capable of making the choice or until the kids turn into adults, parents and schools must create an environment that shows descent maker's alternative to phones. This needs lot of work on behaf of schools and sacrifices on behalf of parents.
Re: An open letter to India’s youth: Get off that smartphone. It can destroy you
#133Earlier quoted context omitted.
> But people who disagree can do so for reasons other than ignorance. Yes, and here's the key: they might still be wrong. I'm not saying this is the case. I'm saying that this is a possibility. "I took an informed decision which is not due to ignorance" doesn't mean the decision can't still be wrong. Not to mention that most people just adopt shiny new stuff, hardly pausing to indeed make informed decisions...
> Yes, and here's the key: they might still be wrong. I truly do not believe I am wrong for having a smartphone in my pocket when going to the store. I understand the structure and behavior of mobile apps and mobile operating systems far better than most. > Not to mention that most people just adopt shiny new stuff, hardly pausing to indeed make informed decisions... Now we are back at the ignorance claim! I've got a…
>Now we are back at the ignorance claim! I've got a PhD in mobile security. I've been working in this space for more than a decade! I assure you I have done more than "hardly pausing".
That's technical knowledge though.
But there's another thing when it comes to ignorance or not, that's not tied to "how they work".
The understanding of their social/political/etc implications.
Someone who even designs smartphones is not necessarily savvy to the latter. If anything, his whole career gives them an incentive not to be ("it's difficult to make somebody understand something whose career depends on not understanding it").
>People claimed that bicycles would cause the destruction of society when they were introduced.
Well, they were not far off :-) Though that's more like a "people have been wrong about X in the past, so they can't be right about Y now".
Re: An open letter to India’s youth: Get off that smartphone. It can destroy you
#134Earlier quoted context omitted.
>And we'll adjust, as we always do I don't understand this line of thinking. Sure, it may not be the literal end of the world, but that doesn't mean that it won't cause a lot of damage before people 'adapt'. People have always adapted to wars, but that doesn't mean that the world wars weren't absolutely catastrophic. And while I don't think that smartphones will 'destroy you', I think there's a good chance that it ca…
How do you feel about television? At least there's some ability to interact with a smartphone, there's absolutely none of that with TV, and yet society survived.
> How do you feel about television?
I think it's kinda too early too judge (only ~60 years of widespread adoption and in this time the TV landscape has changed massively), but I think there's a pretty good chance that 'tabloid style' TV has caused a good deal more damage than the yellow press has.
> At least there's some ability to interact with a smartphone
Sure, but that also makes it a lot more addictive. You generally won't see people who are glued to their TV 24/7, but with smartphones that's not uncommon.
> yet society survived
Again, I'm not saying that society will just implode on itself, just that these things can do a lot of damage.
Re: An open letter to India’s youth: Get off that smartphone. It can destroy you
#135Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Yes, and here's the key: they might still be wrong. I truly do not believe I am wrong for having a smartphone in my pocket when going to the store. I understand the structure and behavior of mobile apps and mobile operating systems far better than most. > Not to mention that most people just adopt shiny new stuff, hardly pausing to indeed make informed decisions... Now we are back at the ignorance claim! I've got a…
> Now we are back at the ignorance claim! I've got a PhD in mobile security. I've been working in this space for more than a decade! I assure you I have done more than "hardly pausing". That's technical knowledge though. But there's another thing when it comes to ignorance or not, that's not tied to "how they work". The understanding of their social/political/etc implications. Someone who even designs smartphones is…
Ok. Be specific then. Why should I leave my phone at home.
Re: An open letter to India’s youth: Get off that smartphone. It can destroy you
#136Yeaaaah, no. I think the reason most of india’s youth is on their phones is because they just have no real prospects in life and the phone is an escape mechanism.
Woah. That's a huge generalization. Why do you think all Indian youth have no prospects?
It is a huge generalization, but nowhere did I use ‘all’. The closes I came was saying ‘most’.
If everyone tries to be an engineer or doctor because that’s the only way to have prospects in life, something is broken.
Re: An open letter to India’s youth: Get off that smartphone. It can destroy you
#137Smart phones will/can whittle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_asymmetry
I think due to smart phones nobody is buying https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chetan_Bhagat novels :)
Re: An open letter to India’s youth: Get off that smartphone. It can destroy you
#138Surprisingly I was told in my youth by many not to read this authors books because they were a waste of time
Re: An open letter to India’s youth: Get off that smartphone. It can destroy you
#139Doom scrolling is a terrifying problem for me, personally. I have only recently realized just how bad it is. I have recently gotten headfirst back into turntablism/vinyl DJ’ing, and leaving my iPhone in my room, just wearing my Apple Watch with me to tell the time and to do a quick voice reply to someone if it’s important enough. I’m trying to start reading books again. It’s scarily hard to keep that level of attenti…
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Re: An open letter to India’s youth: Get off that smartphone. It can destroy you
#140Earlier quoted context omitted.
How do you feel about television? At least there's some ability to interact with a smartphone, there's absolutely none of that with TV, and yet society survived.
> How do you feel about television? I think it's kinda too early too judge (only ~60 years of widespread adoption and in this time the TV landscape has changed massively), but I think there's a pretty good chance that 'tabloid style' TV has caused a good deal more damage than the yellow press has. > At least there's some ability to interact with a smartphone Sure, but that also makes it a lot more addictive. You gene…
I dunno man, the average American (used to) watch eight hours of TV a day. When you look at the changing media landscape, it's that mobiles/PCs are being substituted for TV watching.
Thank you for the answer though, I appreciate consistency when examining the impact of media.